The subject of this week feels especially topical right now, as President Biden has just signed the most significant expansion of healthcare provision in the United States since the Affordable Care Act in 2010. The American Rescue Plan is set to help 1.3 million Americans gain access to healthcare coverage. However, in light of the topics discussed, this seems to pale as an achievement. The ICESCR (International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights) has been ratified by 171 states. This protects ‘the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health’. However, the United States is not one of the states which has ratified the covenant.
In a population counting approximately 331 people, healthcare cover for an additional 1.3 million sounds lacklustre. The question raised of what the ‘highest attainable standard of health’ quite means, and whether the same standard can be applied to rich as poor countries gains traction here. The USA has the highest GDP in the world, enjoying a 24% share of the world’s GDP (Worldometers). To be one of 24 states not part of the ICESCR is surprising.
Lamm raises some interesting points in his essay “The Case Against Making Healthcare a “Right””:
“How Do You Buy Health for Society? One inevitable result of the healthcare dialogue in other countries is that the focus shifts from the individual to the larger question of: How do you buy health for society? These nations have come to the common sense conclusion that public policy ought to maximize a nation’s health, not healthcare.”
The essay is an American based one, so we must keep in mind that the USA did not sign the ICESCR, however this distinction between health and healthcare is very much as at odds with the definition of health found in the covenant:
“Consequently, the right to health must be understood as a right to the enjoyment of a variety of facilities, goods, services and conditions necessary for the realization of the highest attainable standard of health.”
This appears to define health and healthcare much as one, symbiotic idea. To have health, one must have healthcare in direct correlation to a state’s provision. My personal opinion falls more in line with this. As the above image demonstrates, access to healthcare is a moral issue. This does not mean it is not political—political issues themselves are inherently moral. Etymologically, the two words are clearly related. “Political” quite literally means relating to the Greek politēs, or citizen. “Moral” comes from the Latin moralis, or “proper behavior of a person in society”. Healthcare is an issue affecting the welfare of all those in society, it is therefore a moral and political issue.
References
“GDP By Country – Worldometer”. Worldometers.Info, 2021, https://www.worldometers.info/gdp/gdp-by-country/.
Lamm, Richard D. “The Case Against Making Healthcare a ‘Right.’” Human Rights, vol. 25, no. 4, 1998, pp. 8–11. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/27880117. Accessed 26 Mar. 2021.